Posted: Jan 02, 2020 2:00 pm
Cito di Pense wrote:Hermit wrote:
So, how do we test for atheism? For that we need a real-world definition of atheism first (which disqualifies the SEP's article on atheism). I go by what another encyclopedia starts off with:Atheism is, in the broadest sense, an absence of belief in the existence of deities.
The only distinction between atheism and theism that can be made is this absence of belief in the existence of deities.
That treats theism and atheism as two clocks which only exist to wind each other up; such atheism can't exist in the absence of somebody else's belief in deities.
Yes, Cito. If there were no theists - or no atheists - there'd be no clocks that would wind each other up. If winding each other up were the only purpose I'd leave well enough alone.
Unfortunately it's not. Theism has been a Trojan horse to gain and maintain power since time immemorial. It's political. Not only that, it also claims a monopoly on being the provider of morality, which also is ultimately about power and policy. Principally, so the theist argument goes, there are no moral standards without God, and among the God-given moral strictures are:
Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body. Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in every thing.
If a man also lie with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination.
And Judah said unto Onan, Go in unto thy brother's wife, and marry her, and raise up seed to thy brother. And Onan knew that the seed should not be his; and it came to pass, when he went in unto his brother's wife, that he spilled it on the ground, lest that he should give seed to his brother. And the thing which he did displeased the Lord: wherefore he slew him also." And so on, and so forth.